The Hideaway

By: Lauren K. Denton

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Amazon

When her grandmother’s will wrenches Sara back home from New Orleans, she learns more about Margaret Van Buren in the wake of her death than she ever did in life.

After her last remaining family member dies, Sara Jenkins goes home to The Hideaway, her grandmother Mags’s ramshackle B&B in Sweet Bay, Alabama. She intends to quickly tie up loose ends then return to her busy life and thriving antique shop in New Orleans. Instead, she learns Mags has willed her The Hideaway and charged her with renovating it—no small task considering Mags’s best friends, a motley crew of senior citizens, still live there.

Rather than hurrying back to New Orleans, Sara stays in Sweet Bay and begins the biggest house-rehabbing project of her career. Amid Sheetrock dust, old memories, and a charming contractor, she discovers that slipping back into life at The Hideaway is easier than she expected.

Then she discovers a box Mags left in the attic with clues to a life Sara never imagined for her grandmother. With help from Mags’s friends, Sara begins to piece together the mysterious life of bravery, passion, and choices that changed Mags’s destiny in both marvelous and devastating ways.

When an opportunistic land developer threatens to seize The Hideaway, Sara is forced to make a choice—stay in Sweet Bay and fight for the house and the people she’s grown to love or leave again and return to her successful but solitary life in New Orleans.

Why I Choose this Book:

It looked like a delightful read, and when I read the back cover blurb and sample pages it drew me in. I was headed away for vacation and I thought it would be fun to read this book while away. Plus, my sister just remolded an old house, so I figured it was rather fitting.

What I Thought About This Book:

Ugh. That pretty much sums it up. I dislike reviewing books that I didn’t like, but I didn’t just “not like” this book, I was actually unhappy with it. It not only talks about, but also promotes, behaviors and lifestyles that are completely against what the Bible teaches. Since this book was published by Thomas Nelson, I expected something better. (Note: Although I wouldn’t condone a book that is written like this, I would give more leeway in a review if the book wasn’t published by a Christian publishing company. It’s mainly because of the expectations I had because of the publishing company that made me so disappointed with the book.)

I read the first fourth or third of the book, before realizing that the sin the characters were so obviously indulging in probably wasn’t going to be addressed, but instead was being endorsed. After that I scanned the rest of the book, looking for redemption to come, but I never found it.

Conclusion:

I’m disappointed. The plot might be well-done, the characters might be well-written (although in reality I didn’t really get into either), but the aforementioned content makes it so I won’t recommend nor knowingly read more from this author.

Rating:

I’m giving The Hideaway 1 out of 5 stars.

*I received this book from BookLook

This book review isn’t one of my normal ones, it’s more me highlighting a whole series for y’all.

Back in April I entered a giveaway that was sponsored by a lot of authors. Through the giveaway I ended up subscribing to all their newsletters – I didn’t have to in order to enter the giveaway, but I thought it’d be a good way to meet new authors.

After the giveaway (which I didn’t win), ended, a bunch of the author sent out newsletters introducing themselves, and many of them included links to free e-books, which was pretty amazing. One of those authors really stuck out to me because she said “One of the best parts of being an author is connecting with my readers – so why not reply to this email and tell me a little about yourself.” So, even though I’d never heard of the author before the giveaway, I replied. Thus started a short conversation between the two of us that got me interested in reading her books.

I’ve enjoyed this series so much that it’s taken me less than a month to read through all of it. When I finished the 5th book in the series I was disappointed to learn that book #6 hadn’t been released yet. I pre-ordered it right away, then went ahead and contacted the author, asking her if she’d consider sending me an early copy so I could review it, and she graciously agreed. *cue excitement*

Backcover Blurb: 

A global epidemic has doctors and health-care workers panicked, but life continues on as usual for college sophomore Kennedy Stern, who’s not about to let a little virus interrupt her premed studies or dampen her spring break.

When she finds herself isolated in a hospital lockdown, Kennedy and all those quarantined with her can only guess who will survive and who will succumb to the deadly threat confronting them.

An exciting new release from award-winning Christian suspense novelist Alana Terry.

I was in the middle of another book at the time I received this book, so I didn’t get around to diving into Infected until a day or two after I received it. Then the book drew me in, intrigued me, and made me want to keep reading, reading, reading. (And that I did, until I finally finished the book a little after one last night.)

Once again Miss Alana delivered a winner. The characters are well-developed, unique, and stay true to who they are, while having believable character growth. The book starts out at a slow pace – something I really like, because it has time for me to enjoy the characters before the action begins; kinda like visiting with friends. All my favorite characters were back in this book, including Dominic. I was *so* happy to see Dominic and only wish he’d have been in more scenes. (And, that’s all I’ll say, even though it’s hard to stop there, because I don’t want to have any spoilers.)

As always Kennedy responded to things in such a different way than I would, which made it intriguing to see the world from her point of view. I like how her parents play a clear part in the book, even when they physically haven’t been present in any of them.

One of the main characters in this book is Wrong, a little boy who was adopted from Korea. He was written so realistically that even I felt tired listening to the many questions he asked Kennedy; he also reminded me of a kid I know. His questions, appetites, and random hang-ups (“No, that’s not good grammar, you have to say it this way!”), made him a charming, albeit somewhat annoying child. (It’s clear Miss Alana knows how to write kids well.)

This book deals with issues about why God allows sickness. This is a subject I have thought about and studied a lot due to fighting a disease for nearly a third of my life. Once again I felt like the book was mostly about asking questions on this topic, not giving answers, which in reality is fine and didn’t bother me in the other books. Since this topic is so close to me though, I really wished that the subject of living in a sin cursed world, and the fact that *that’s* why there’s sickness in the world, would have been brought up. Because of that being absent, the book fell just-just-just short of the four-star mark for me. (I rarely give out four-stars for books – in fact, the Kennedy Stern series has received most of my four-star ratings for the last two months of fiction reading, with half the books in the series reaching that allusive status.)

After the first part of the book the pace really picked up, and a few plot twists occurred. As always the writing was well done, the plot well crafted, and the storyline intriguing. I did find myself skimming a bit of Kennedy’s internal monologs at times, simply because I *had* to find out what was happening next.

If you like reading well-written contemporary books with non-detailed violence, then I highly recommend this series. I can hardly wait for the next book in the series…. Oh, and just a note. You really do need to start out with Book #1, and read the books in order. You can read the first book for free here. 

I’m giving Infected 3 out of 5 stars, and 7 out of 10.

You can find out more about Alana Terry (including the fact that she lives in Alaska!) at her website by clicking here. 

Brave is the New Beautiful 

BY: Lee Wolfe Blum

Find it on:

Amazon

I’m giving Brave is the New Beautiful 4 out of 5 stars, and 8 out of 10.

*I received this book from Litfuse

Think Again: Relief from the Burden of Introspection

By: Jared Mellinger

Find it on:

Amazon

Although I’m not sure how overly introspective I am, feeling extremely guilty when I’ve made a mistake or messed something up is something I’ve struggled with all of my life. (And I’m talking about my day feeling ruined because of something that most people would have forgotten about in a matter of minutes.) Therefore, I figure this book might provide a healthy and balanced perspective.

What I Thought about this Book:

Yes, yes, and yes. This book was a solid four-star read. Nearly every page had me nodding. Lightbulbs were going off. It was good. The book was incredibly balanced, practical, and easy to understand. It was also interesting, flowed well, and made a lot of sense. So, pretty much combine that with a topic I needed to study, and we have a winning book. (In fact, those six elements are the big things I look for in nonfiction, and this book hit all of them.)

One of the biggest things I realized while reading this book is that when I feel guilty, it’s most likely because I’m taking my eyes off of Jesus to focus too much on myself. (Which, strangely enough, isn’t something I would have realized on my own.) Feeling guilty can be helpful, but it can be very detrimental, too. Not only did this book explain why people are introspective at times, but the book also went through when it’s healthy, how it’s healthy, and when and why and how it can be unhealthy, too. Then, it followed up with what we can do to become more balanced and healthy in the area of introspection. The book was through and moved along at a fast clip and impressed me a lot.

Although it’s good to take time to evaluate how we’re doing in life, it’s so important for us to do that quickly and then get the focus off of ourselves and look back to Jesus. The book also talked very practically about when it’s a good time to be introspective, and when it’s a bad time. For instance, you don’t want to take time to be introspective at the end of a long day when you’re exhausted, yet that’s naturally when our brains start going through events and beating us up. Obviously, that isn’t healthy. So, we need to teach ourselves to not allow our minds to begin taking inventory of how we’re doing, but instead to focus on Jesus and His goodness during times like that.

All in all, the book was totally spot-on.

Conclusion:

I highly recommend this book – not only to people who struggle with introspection, but pretty much to anyone.

Rating: 

I’m giving Think Again 4 out of 5 stars, and 8 out of 10.

*I received this book from Litfuse